Review code provided by the publisher
When I jumped into Lost Words: Beyond the Page, I never expected its story to reach out and pull my heart-strings as it did. It’s a game that while offering fun and forward-thinking gameplay, also delivers a story of love, loss, and grief. It’s a story that most, if not all of us have experienced. Through its gameplay, however, Lost Words is able to make players really feel connected to the characters and their specific tale.
Story
The game revolves around its main character, a young girl named Izzy who writes daily in her journal. Through this journal, we learn about her daily interactions with family or the way that she’s feeling. It also acts as her method of choice when writing her own original story about a young girl with magic powers. It’s a great dual-story style and the game bounces between both organically to show us the similarities and direction each is going.
Eventually, there’s a tragedy that happens in the story that affects Izzy, which in turn then affects her fictional character a well. The deepness and seriousness behind Izzy’s feelings of this tragedy are realistic and completely warranted. Even though she’s a child, her thoughts and feelings are something even adults feel when in the same situation. Her story directly connected with me and made me draw so many similarities to things I’ve experienced in my own life. It’s a story that will always stand the test of time.
Gameplay
Like its story, the gameplay is dual-sided and when each story is being told, the gameplay will switch to the other style. It offers a gameplay loop that changes often and adds new flourishes to each one as you progress. The first side of gameplay is set on the pages of Izzy’s journal. While at first glance, it may not look like much is possible, the developers through their innovative minds were able to make it just as intriguing as the other side of the game.
As a little character that I’m guessing looks like Izzy, you walk across the top of the words real-world Izzy is writing. You’ll jump on highlighted words to continue her writing and run into little stars to uncover hidden messages and notes to further show us the mindset she’s in. There’s also a lot to do besides just running across words though. The game gives you a cursor to use for its entirety and this mechanic will have you move things such as words and images around to create new paths, fill in pictures, or uncover memories.
It’s pretty simple but it’s done in such a way that it held my attention from the time that I started until I finished running around the end credits scene. I also found it to be a fresh way to have players live the story while having the gameplay feel like we’re actually contributing and having fun doing it. It also helps that the game has a gorgeous art style that made jumping around the pages a beauty to behold. As a writer, I can also connect with just how it can feel to put your feelings onto the page/screen whether it be for yourself or others.
The other side of the gameplay is a more traditional platformer which even on its own is fun and original. Izzy’s magical character she writes has a unique set of powers that allows her to pull words and place them in her book. In these segments, your cursor is a firefly that pulls the words from the book to have them interact with the world. It’ll help this character overcome obstacles and continue on her journey.
You can raise the obstacles, break them, repair them, and even sometimes, ignore them altogether. It’s a pretty non-traditional platformer that I had a lot of fun with. There also isn’t any combat so you actually have the time to take in the story and gameplay without worrying about getting smooshed every other moment. One thing that I wish was a little more developed was the difficulty in the puzzles. They can be slightly difficult but I never found myself scratching my head.
Within the levels, you’ll also get to choose things about your character and some of the characters she meets. I liked having the chance to make the decision on some important details because it made me feel included in the story. There’s also an occasional point in the game where you can choose this character’s dialogue as well but I don’t believe it changes the story or ending at all. Each level also has a number of missing fireflies that it’ll want you to collect but again, it doesn’t seem that whether you collect all or none has any impact on the game.
Visuals
Lost Words uses beautiful and deep colors in both of its art styles. I’d say my favorite visuals come from the journal portions of the game. It’s all pretty gorgeous but the hand-painted-looking entries just really look great. The visuals also manage to bring Izzy’s feelings to the forefront through them which really made me get the feels. There’s also a pretty awesome Star Wars-inspired section, which wins me over by default.
Audio
Each character in Lost Words is acted extremely well and I’m seriously impressed by just how much dialogue there actually is. The game is run on so much dialogue that by the end of the story, both Izzy and her fantasy-world counterpart are fully fleshed out. Another great surprise was how fantastic the music is as well. It adds yet another layer to the story and I loved when I’d hear certain tracks used more than once.
Replayability
During my playthrough, I thought about replayability a lot. It isn’t a difficult game with tons of hard puzzles to return to and master. What it does have though is the beautiful yet sad story that it delivers. It’s a story that anyone can connect with and I think that those of us who feel connected to the story will want to experience it more than once.
What It Could Have Done Better
My only issues with the game aren’t huge but they were what I felt like extra baggage added to pad the gameplay. I don’t think collecting the fireflies was all that important as it doesn’t seem to make a difference as I hadn’t collected all of them by the time the story wrapped up. Another thing is that the dialogue choices don’t make a difference either. I liked choosing them but to see that they didn’t mean all that much was kind of a bummer.
Verdict
Lost Words: Beyond the Page is a story that had me not only care for its characters but made me recount moments from my own life. Through its beauty and sorrow, it’s a genuine story of the strength that we find in ourselves during heartache. Moving on doesn’t mean forgetting and it’s the love for those we lose that shapes us. The game executes these themes masterfully in all aspects and it’s something you wouldn’t want to miss.
